


love is just a word (the idea seems absurd)

by kaneklutz



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Day Four: Touchstarved, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Lonely Eyes, M/M, TMAHCweek, The Magnus Archives Hurt/Comfort Week, i feel like i fall into humour too easily when i write this ship, no beta we die like uh probably both characters in this fic by the end of TMA, so you might see that, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:55:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26140729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaneklutz/pseuds/kaneklutz
Summary: "Something's wrong. It's stopped hurting"-An avatar of the Lonely and an avatar of the Beholding walk into abarrelationship. It was bound to blow up in their faces.(Written for day four of TMA Hurt/Comfort week)
Relationships: Elias Bouchard/Peter Lukas
Comments: 10
Kudos: 67





	love is just a word (the idea seems absurd)

**Author's Note:**

> three things:
> 
> 1 - this is set pre canon, and I am playing very fast and very loose with the timeline because I don't know it at all but that's okay neither does Jonny (i'm kidding sir i'm sorry i have a lot of respect for your work, please never read this)
> 
> 2 - I am very Canadian and did not write this in time to beg any of my UK pals to look it over, nor do I have a beta! It happens, forgive my errors, point them out in the comments if you feel like it
> 
> 3 - The prompts for today are "touch-starved", "sharp", and "fragile". I don't remember if I stuck to those prompts. Cheers!

Elias knows him too well. 

It’s part of the brand, of course. Being an avatar of the Eye must involve always watching, always knowing. Just as Peter feeds off the separation, the isolation, and the slow destruction of any emotional connection, Elias feeds off his voyeuristic tendencies and his ability to force people into reliving trauma. 

Which, upon brief reflection, is likely why their relationship is the way it is. Fierce, almost competitive, leaving Peter always slightly unsure whether they are lovers or rivals. When asked, Elias only laughs and asks, “why not both?” 

It works out, he supposes. Peter’s god doesn’t particularly enjoy the way he subjects himself to this scrutiny, and neither does he, but needs must. He knows what it is to need, to live off people, knows it intimately, and so he allows Elias to Know his fill, shrouds himself away in the Lonely when it’s too much, and leaves for weeks on the Tundra when even that doesn’t feel like enough to wash the evidence of another knowing him from his skin. 

The knowing, the seeing, he’s learned to deal with effectively enough. But what’s harder to avoid is the touching. 

Because Elias always has his damn hands all over him. 

Peter hadn’t expected this from him, the familiarity, the incessant brushing of skin on skin. Elias seems, at first glance, cold as the icy waters Peter travels through. His demeanour may be more charismatic than Peter’s, his smile less painfully false, but there is no denying that Elias, despite appearances, enjoys the more physical forms of comfort. 

It’s not just the sex either. Sex, Peter can understand. He rarely participates in it himself, because it’s not an experience he often finds pleasurable, compared to how he hears Elias describe it. Though, to be fair, there is a certain flavour of loneliness in a one night stand, in his partner for the evening waking to the cold morning sun and an empty bed. It’s appealing, on occasion. 

No, what Peter finds tricky to deal with coming from Elias is the more casual forms of intimacy. The need to always be too close, pressed into Peter’s side. The way he loops an arm loosely around Peter’s, reaches out to embrace him, holds his hand like Peter is his, like he has been claimed. 

That sort of affection proves to be uncomfortable. 

No, not just uncomfortable. Painful. 

And yet painful isn’t quite right either. He can never find the words to say what he means. Elias is eloquent, delivers scathing retorts and elegantly clever remarks, where Peter is all short answers and the occasional monologue whenever he feels there is something worth talking over. The sound of his own voice talking to himself does bring its own form of solitude. But no matter the amount of words he can force himself to expel, none are ever correct, none ever fully express what he means. So for now, he’ll settle on describing what he feels as pain. 

It is, in a way, painful, to stay present when Elias gets too close. The urge to disappear ramps up steadily, and he finds himself itching to crawl away into the fog, leaving nothing but whistling, crackly static in his wake. When Elias tries to caress him, nudge him in the side, lean into him, Peter aches to make it stop. 

He thinks Elias knows. Maybe he’s just used to Elias projecting an air of omniscience, but Peter sees the smirks that linger on his husband’s face when Elias thinks he isn’t looking. He would never be able to get Elias to outright admit it though. 

Peter grows used to putting real effort into remaining present when Elias gets too close. He learns to steel himself when Elias sidles up beside him, or links their arms when they’re walking, and is fully accustomed to the way static fills his head and shivers through his veins when he feels the warmth of Elias’s body pressed against him. Because-

Because if this is a game, if this is just another bet or competition to win, if Elias is playing a long, long game with him, then Peter’s damned if he’s going to lose. 

Which is presumably why, with his hyperawareness, he notices quite quickly when it stops being hard to remain. 

* * *

They’re sitting in Elias’s office at the institute, together on the worn leather loveseat, a small gap of space left between them with the way Peter presses himself into the armrest. Peter’s reading some book on sailor superstitions that Elias had gifted him for their last anniversary, and Elias is poring over various folders and a spreadsheet opened on his laptop. It’s a familiar scene, and Peter isn’t surprised when Elias finally gives up on budgeting, gathers all his documents up in a pile with an irritated huff, shoves his laptop aside, and slides closer so he can curl into Peter’s side. Peter’s arm automatically lifts for Elias to cozy up under, and he braces for the rush of static, the shivery coldness of Lonely that wants him to run far, far away. 

But it doesn’t come. He blinks in confusion, because Elias has practically pressed his small frame into Peter’s body, and the familiarity of it all should be suffocating him, should be triggering the fog that swirls through his blood, should be- 

“Elias?”

“Hm?” Elias murmurs, face half-pressed into Peter’s side. His hair is dishevelled, blond strands scattered in all directions, and it is achingly precious.

“What is it, darling?”

“Why doesn’t-“ he struggles with himself, unsure whether he wants to tell Elias anything, when he already takes so much from Peter all the time, and calls it fair. “What’s different?” he asks at last. 

Elias pushes himself into a seated position, and his legs fold neatly underneath him while he fixes Peter with a questioning glance. “Nothing’s different. Are you quite alright, Peter?”

He shakes his head, because something is different, he is _certain_ something is wrong. Nothing changed when Elias moved away, there was no twisting sense of relief/disappointment like there always is when Elias backs off. 

“Something’s wrong. It’s stopped hurting.” 

Elias looks at him in confusion, a single eyebrow raised elegantly, because Elias is such a bloody drama queen. “Peter, _what’s_ stopped hurting?”

“You,” Peter says, because he’s not compelled but Elias is so compelling, and he’s abruptly exhausted of mind games and paranoia. “It always hurts when you do this, but it didn’t hurt today, so you’re doing something.” 

“I’m not doing anything to you, Peter. We’re sitting together on a sofa, like we always do. I don’t understand what you mean when you say that I’m somehow hurting you.”

“No, you always know, you always, always know,” Peter says, shaking his head as he gets to his feet, letting the book in his hand fall back onto his seat. “You know what you’ve been doing to me, all this time, and I’ve been fine with it because I thought it was just another one of your damn games, just another con, but now it doesn’t hurt, and the rules have changed but I don’t know what they are, so _what are you doing to me?_ “

Elias watches his rant with a cold gaze that Peter has seen time and time again, though rarely turned against him. “Are you done?” is all he has to offer when Peter finishes at last. 

He nods, stiffly. 

“Good,” Elias says, standing as well and brushing invisible lint off his sleeves. His height doesn’t match up to Peter’s, and Elias doesn’t intimidate him by any means, but there is a sense of power, of authority to his stance. It’s attractive, and breathtaking, and Peter cannot help but wait in silence for Elias to speak. 

“You’re being foolish,” Elias begins, and Peter flinches. “I have never had any intention to bring any harm to you in the first place, and the fact that you’re presuming I would have the time or the energy to invest in playing some sort of game with my husband in this manner is frankly absurd. Really, Peter, this doesn’t sound anything like it’s my fault, only the fault of someone who never properly learned how to balance his own life and his patron’s whims.”

Peter closes his eyes briefly, willing himself to not run away, like he knows Elias wants him to. He won’t allow Elias to have the last word again. “It’s not that, it’s just different now, Elias. It hurt before, and I could hardly stand it. Now it doesn’t feel like that, so something has to be wrong.” 

“Ask yourself this, Peter. Why did you resist the call of your god? Why didn’t you just leave? I honestly, don’t believe that you were this determined to win a game when there wasn’t a prize specified for you to win, after all.”

He stares in confusion, and feels the prickles of uncertainty and fear tugging at him. 

“Is it because you’re unused to having anyone interfere with your patron, given that the majority of your life has been spent secluding yourself from the possibility of any damage whatsoever? In doing so, you’ve eliminated any possibility of growth in your powers, you know. Or perhaps you’re just weak, Peter. Perhaps your god is rejecting you, and you are rejecting it, because you needed what I was giving you, and at last your mortal self has surrendered.” 

When Peter doesn’t respond, Elias nods. “I’ll leave that to you to figure out. Feel free to leave now, if that’s what suits you. There’s no game to win, after all.” 

_We’re always playing a game,_ Peter thinks dully. 

Elias walks over to his desk, seats himself behind it and reopens his laptop, flicks open a folder of papers. “And in the end, it’s not my fault the Lonely’s begun to reject you, is it? I serve my patron, and I do it well. It seems to me, all that’s wrong is that you’ve failed to serve yours.” 

“Fuck you,” is all Peter can spit out before he disappears in a burst of static. 

* * *

Elias waits for precisely 90 seconds before allowing his head to fall into his hands.

“Damn it, you fool.” 

* * *

Elias returns home on a cold December evening many months later, and flicks on the light switch to see Peter sitting in his thick woollen coat, on the armchair that has been left untouched ever since he left. 

“What a surprise,” Elias says drily. “You could have turned the lights on, it’s your electric bill.” 

“It’s more peaceful this way,” Peter says. “Thought you’d like the touch of drama. Even if I’m sure you saw me before you got here.” 

“Yes,” Elias acknowledges with a dip of his head. “Although I couldn’t see you, exactly. Only the outline of you. And barely that, you’ve gotten stronger. Well done.”

“Thanks. How was work, honey?” Peter replies, a half smile creeping up on his face. It does not reach his eyes. 

“No more interesting than usual.” 

“Shame.” 

They stare at each other, Elias in the doorway, Peter staring up at him from the plush armchair. It’s an odd scene. 

“I see your vacation helped then,” Elias says at last, crossing the living room to enter the kitchen, dumping his coat and satchel on the bench by the doorway as he goes. 

“It did, glad you noticed,” Peter responds. He doesn’t move to follow Elias, seemingly content to remain seated. 

Elias prepares tea, plucks the kettle off the stove just before it begins to whistle and not bothering to find sugar or cream. He reenters the living room, passes a cup etched with silver and green geometric designs, elegant lines and swirls decorating the sides in mathematical precision. Peter takes the cup, and doesn’t acknowledge the burn of the hot tea through the ceramic.

“You’ve recovered?” Elias asks, blowing gently on his own cup, watching as the steam wafts off the surface of his tea. 

Peter nods. 

“I thought so,” Elias continues. “You’ve changed quite a bit. It’s noticeable, if you know what to look for.” 

Peter hums in acknowledgement, but doesn’t actually respond with his words. 

“So this is it then?”

When Peter doesn’t respond for the third time, Elias sets down his cup on the coffee table, deliberately careful, crosses his legs and leans back against the settee. “I see. I’ll have the divorce papers written up. You’ll have them in a week. I trust that nothing on the business side of things will suffer, though if you wish to have an intermediary party for our meetings I won’t begrudge you that.” He delivers the words calmly, as if they are discussing the budget for the institute, and hashing out a particularly troublesome procedure. 

Peter takes a final sip from his cup, somehow having drained it while the tea was still steaming hot, and sets it down as well, with an audible clink as ceramic meets wood. 

“Elias,” he says calmly, “what are you talking about?” 

He tilts his head, a smooth mask of delicate bemusement settling upon his face. “Our divorce, Peter. Someone has to sort out the details of it all, and I don’t think you’ve offered?” 

“And we’re getting a divorce for what reason, precisely?” 

“Well, you see, Peter, my husband has been _missing,_ for a year and a half. Usually, I don’t expect them to come back after so long. Either they’re dead or they’ve gone off to do who knows what, so I don’t know what to do with you now that you’re back, and the only thing I _can_ think of is a divorce, because I don’t believe I particularly want anything to do with you.”

“You’re upset,” Peter notes mildly. 

“And as usual, it took you far too long to notice,” Elias responds, equally as smooth. 

Peter shrugs. “Well, I’ve noticed now. Anything you want me to do about it?”

“Anything you could have done would’ve been an appreciated gesture, oh, say a year ago, maybe even eight months. But no, you’ve chosen now to reappear, and I’m sorry to say that I am done with you, Peter, I-“

Peter’s standing up, and Elias has forgotten quite how tall he is, and is walking towards him. It would be alarming, if it wasn’t Peter.

What is alarming, however, is what his maybe-husband does next. Instead of doing something Peter-like, he sits down on the sofa besides Elias, and doesn’t even press himself against the far end like usual. He just sits down, not too close to Elias, but not too far from him either. 

“What are you doing, Peter?” Elias asks, affecting a blunt tone. It comes out a bit too pitchy, and he resists the juvenile urge to cringe. 

Peter smiles innocently back. “Sitting?”

“No, you don’t just- you’ve never just sat,“ Elias says, with a wave of his hands that he knows doesn’t do a thing to clarify what he’s trying to make clear. “You’ve always sat differently, not like this.”

“Well, you wouldn’t tell me what was wrong, and you didn’t say you _didn’t_ miss me,” Peter says calmly. “You used to like sitting with me like this, so I thought it would be something I could do that you might like.”

Elias gapes at him in blank confusion. “This doesn’t solve anything, Peter. This isn’t any sort of solution, this is just-“ he doesn’t know what this is, and spends precious seconds floundering for words. 

“Won’t it hurt?” he finds himself asking in the end. It’s almost surprising, even for him, to find that he still sort of cares. 

“You can know the answer to that,” Peter says. “Why don’t you try?”

Elias frowns, sharpens his gaze and does his best to See Peter. Where the weak link in Peter’s mental barrier once was is gone, and he can’t find another one. 

“I can’t,” he admits at last, loathe to admit there is something he cannot do. 

Peter shrugs. “Well, to keep a long story short, I did what you said. Learned to balance. Or rather, learned to bargain. Finally gained some control, isn’t that something?”

When Elias doesn’t respond, Peter sighs and beckons him over. “Come here,” he says, more gently. 

Elias shuffles over, pressing into Peter’s side like he hasn’t done for so long, and he can breathe a little easier. 

“This doesn’t fix anything, Peter,” he mumbles as Peter’s arm circles around him. 

“I know,” Peter said. “But it’s a start, isn’t it?”

And if it is different now, if Peter’s embrace is that much colder and Elias doesn’t feel as safe as he used to, well. It is indeed a start.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, kudos and comments if you would like, but I appreciate you regardless of that! Oh, one last thing, title taken from the lyrics of "Lover, Don't Leave" by Citizen Shade


End file.
